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SPEECH 



HON. WILLIAM H. SEWARD, 

AT AUBURN, OCTOBER 20, 1865. 



The friends and neighbors of Secretary Seward, desiring to 
manifest their regard for him previous to his return to Wash- 
ington, paid him a parting visit at his residence on Friday, 
October 20, 1865. Tlie weather was cold and stormy, but a 
large number of citizens were, nevertheless, in attendance. 
The Rev. Dr. Hawley, of the First Presbyterian Church, ad- 
dressed the Secretary in behalf of the citizens in the following- 
remarks : 

REMARKS OF REV. DR. HAWLEY. 

Secretary Seward: Your friends and neighbors are gathered in this 
informal manner to welcome you home once more, in the midst of familiar 
scenes and cherished associations. A cordial and affectionate greetino^ 
always awaits you in Auburn, Whenever you have come back to us, 
whether from journeyings in foreign lands, or to seek a brief respite from 
public cares, in times of peace or war, we have claimed the privilege of 
neighbors, to take you by the hand and listen to your words of cheer and 
counsel. 

Time and events have strengthened these bonds of friendship and made 
them sacred. • The trials and sufferings, personal and national, which 



luive come of tlie war, now happily ended, have tauglit us all lessons of 
patience and wisdom, brotherly kindness and charity. No sorrow in the 
smn of agony Avhich the nation has paid for its life, conspicuous or ob-^ 
scure, has been in vain. The path of duty is always the path of sacri- 
fice. The men who stood at the head of Government, in that terrible 
time, and bore the daily burden, did not ask others to brave dangers 
Avhich they were not Avilling, themselves, to encounter. In their mission, 
given them of Heaven to fulfill with a consecrated patriotism, and relig- 
ious fidelity, they did not count their own lives dear unto them. Our 
beloved President, whose woi'th none could have known as you kncAv it, 
whose confidence and labors and perils you shared so largely, must at 
last make his grave with the martyrs of liberty, to complete the nation's 
sacrifice. 

It has been your lot, my dear sir, after a long and honored service of 
the State, and in the orderings of a wise Providence, which in a great 
crisis always regards the fitness of men for their place, to take a chief 
part in the momentous events of the past five years. The whole Avorld 
knows where you have stood, and what you have done, and what you 
have suftered, toward the result over Avhich all now rejoice. The past is 
secure — and the rcAvard is certain. Need I say that all this while, you 
have had our support and confidence, our sympathy and our prayers. 
The blow from the assassin's hand, which struck you down, smote our 
hearts. The great national bereavement put on a deeper gloom because 
of the peril that hung over your life, and the lives of your household, 
which has always been a part of ourselves. We wept with you, when 
the life, dear to you as your own, was taken. We rejoiced with you, 
when the life Avhich was bound up in yours was restored. 

I know you will pardon this allusion to scenes and events Avhich have 
endeared you to your friends and neighbors, not only, but have attracted 
public sympathy at home and abroad. They make this interview one of 
thoughtful and tender interest. They lift public life out of the sphere of 
personal ambition, and partizan strife, and invest it with unwonted dig- 
nities aud sacred memories. And now, through the mercy of God, who 
has wrought a great salvation for our common country, and has given to 



all that measure of -wisdom and courage, and sacrifice, whicli the time 
demanded, we greet you to-day, in renewed health and vigor, hopeful for 
the future, as in the past, still at your post, and taking your part in the 
more congenial task of restoring to the whole country the blessings of 
Peace and Union and Liberty. 

This is a visit both of welcome and of parting — for a season. May 
our Heavenly Father ever have you and your family in His care and 
loving kindness ; and may it please Him so to guide you and all who 
have charge of public trusts, as to fulfill the best hopes we cherish for 
our nation and for all men. 

At the conclusion of Dr. Hawley's remarks Secretary Seward 
addressed his neighbors and friends from the steps of his resi- 
dence, as follows : 

SPEECH (IF HOX. W. H. SEWARD. 

My Good Friends: A meeting with you here from time to time, as 
opportunity serves and duty permits, is not merely a privilege, but even 
a blessing. Your greeting on this occasion comes in the season when 
fruits are clustered around us, although the leaves above our heads and 
the grass beneatli our feet are yet fresh and green. The assemblage 
which has gathered to express to me its good wishes harmonizes Avith the 
season and the scene. HoAvever youthful a townsman of Auburn is, he 
is nevertheless liabitually thoughtful ; however old, he is yet always cheer- 
ful and hopeful. This particular greeting calls up not mere fancies, but 
memories — some new and others old ; some pleasing, others mournful : 
some private, others public; with all of which, however, you all are inti- 
mately and generously associated ; and those memories have become so 
indellibly impressed upon me that they seem to me to constitute a part of 
my very being. We have met occasionally during the past five years, 
but always under circumstances that were painful, and which excited 
deep solicitude. You freely gave me your sympathies then, even when 
my visits were hurried ; when my appeals to you, and through you to 
more distant fellow-citizens, to make new efforts and sacrifices for our 
suflfering countr}^, must have seemed querulous and exacting ; but when 



cither public or private anxieties denied me the privilege of even tempo- 
rary rest and calmness. Who that labored under the weight of a dispro- 
portionate responsibility could have rested or been at ease, when the 
land which he ought to love with more than earthly affection was threat- 
ened every day with a violent dissolution of its political institutions, to 
to be too quickly followed by domestic anarcliy, and afterwards by impe- 
rial, and possibly foreign despotism! Would to God that the patriots of 
Mexico had never, in the midst of her civil commotions, taken to them- 
selves the comfort of indifference and repose ! But all is now changed. 
The civil war is ended. Death has removed his victims ; liberty has 
crowned her heroes, and humanity has canonized her martyrs ; the sick 
and the stricken are cured ; the surviving combatants are fraternizing ; 
and the country — the object of our just pride and lawful affection — once 
more stands collected and composed, firmer, stronger, and more majestic 
than ever before, without one cause of dangerous discontent at home, 
and without an enemy in the Avorld. Why should we not felicitate each 
other on this change, and upon the ncAV prospects which open before us? 

These prospects, however, cover a broad field. I could not rightly 
tax your kindness so much as to survey the whole of it ; and even if I 
were AMlling, you would kindl} remember that at the present moment my 
power of speech is abridge^' Only magnanimous themes are worthy of 
your nitellectual understanding, or compatible with the feelings which 
have moved this inter ;iew. 

We have lost the great and good Abraham Lincoln. He had reached 
a stage of moral consideration when his name alone, if encircled with a 
martyr's wreath, Avould be more useful to humanity than his personal 
efforts could be beneficial to any one country as her chosen chief magis- 
trate. He is now associated with Washington. The two American 
chiefs, though they are dead, still live, and they are leading the entire 
human race in a more spirited progress towards fields of broader liberty 
and higher civilization. 

In the place of Abraham Lincoln we have a new President. To most 
of you he is personally unknown. The people around me, with their 
customary thoughtfulness, are inquiring of those who are nearer to him 
than themselves what manner of man Andrew Johnson is, and what man- 



ner of President lie maybe expected to be. When, in 18G1, treason, 
laying aside, for the moment, the already obnoxious mask of slavery, and 
investing itself with the always attractive and honored robes of Demo- 
cratic freedom, flashed its lurid light through the Senate chamber, and 
announced, as already completed, a dissolution of the Union, then a 
leader, who should be at first a Senatorial and afterwards a popular 
leader, was required, to awaken sleeping loyalty and patriotism through- 
out the land, to rouse its unconscious hosts and to inspire them with the 
resolution needed to rescue the Constitution, suppress the rebellion, and 
preserve the integrity of the Republic. To me reason seemed to suggest, 
in this case, as a necessity resulting from circumstances, that that leader 
while he should be a capable, inflexible, and devoted patriot, should also 
be a citizen of a hesitating Border State — a slaveholder in practice, 
though not in principle, and yet in principle and association a Democrat. 
Andrew Johnson, of Tennessee, completely filled these complex condi- 
tions, and Avith the consent of the whole American people he assumed 
the great responsibility. The insurrection soon became flagitious, inso- 
lent, defiant, and announced, to the astonishment of mankind, that the 
pretended free empire which it was building by usurpation within forbid- 
den borders was founded upon the corner-stone of slavery ! The newly- 
inaugurated President, with decision, not unaccompanied by characteristic 
prudence, announced that thenceforth slavery should be deemed and 
treated as a public enemy. Andrew Johnson accepted the new condition 
of his popular leadership which this announcement created, and thence- 
forward he openly, freely, and honestly declared, not only that the 
erection of the new edifice should be prevented, but the corner-stone of 
slavery itself^ the rock of all our past as well as of all our then future 
dangers, should be uplifted and removed, and cast out from the Republic. 
Whatever may have been thought by you, or by me, or by others, at that 
time, it is now apparent that the attempted revolution culminated when 
the national banner Avas for the first time successfully replanted by our 
gallant army on the banks of the Cumberland, and when Tennessee, first 
among the Border States which had been reluctantly carried into rebel- 
lion, ofiered once more a foothold and a resting-place to the authorities 



of the Union. From that time, while it was yet necessary to prosecute 
the war with such energies as human nature had never before exerted, it 
was at tlie same time equally needful, with wisdom which had never been 
surpassed, to prosecute the beneficent work of restoring the Union, and 
harmonizing the great political family which, although it had been tem- 
porarily distracted, was destined, nevertheless, to live and grow forever 
under that majestic protection. The abolition of slavery was thenceforth 
cijually an element of persistent Avar and of returning peace. He neither 
reads history with care nor studies the Avays of Providence Avith reverence, 
Avho docs not see that, for the prosecution of these double, diverse, and 
yet e([ually important purposes of Avar and peace, AndrcAV Johnson Avas 
fitly appointed to be a Provisional (lovernor in Tennessee — the first of a 
series of Provisional Governors afterAvards to be assigned to the insur- 
rectionary States — and Avas subsequently elected Vice President, and in 
the end constitutionally inaugurated President of the United States. 

We are continually hearing debates concerning the origin and authority 
of the plan of restoration. Ncav converts. North and South, call it the 
President's plan. All speak of it as if it Avere a ncAv and recent devel- 
opment. On the contrary, Ave now see that it is not specially AndrcAV 
Johnson's plan, nor even a new plan in any respect. It is the plan which 
abruptly yet distinctly offered itself to the last Administration, at the 
moment I have before recalled, Avhen the Avork of restoration Avas to 
begin; at the moment Avhen, although by the Avorld unperceived, it did 
begin, and it is the only plan Avhich thus seasonably presented itself; and, 
therefore, is the only possible plan Avhich then or ever afterAvard could 
be adopted. This plan, altliough occasionally requiring variation of de- 
tails, nevertheless admits of no substantial change or modification. It 
could neither be enlarged nor contracted. State conventions in loyal 
States, hoAvever favorable, in disloyal States, hoAvever hostile, could not 
hiAvfully or effectually disallow it; and even the people themselves, when 
amending the Constitution of the United States, are only giving to that 
plan its just and needful sovereign sanction. In the meantime, the ex- 
ecutive and legislative authorities of Congress can do no more than dis- 
charge their proper functions of protecting the recently insurgent States 
from anarchy during the intervening period Avhile the plan is being car- 



riecl into execution. It is essential to this plan that the insurrectionary 
States shall, by themselves, and for themselves, accept and adopt this 
plan, and thereby submit themselves to and recognize the national autho- 
rity. This is what I meant when I said to Mr. Adams, in a passage 
which you may possibly recall, that in the sense in which the word sub- 
jugation was then used by the enemies of the United States, at home and 
abroad, it was not the expectation or purpose of this Government that 
the Southern States should be subjugated; but that I thought that those 
States Avould be brought, by the judiciously mingled exercise of pressure 
and persuasion, to a condition in Avhich they would voluntarily return to 
their allegiance. This was the explanation which Mr. Adams gave to 
Lord Palmerston, the Prime Minister of England, when that great, and, 
as I trust, not unfriendly statesman, said that he did not believe that the 
Federal Union could ])e restored, because he knew that while any man 
can lead a horse to the Avater, no man could make him drink. The plan, 
therefore, recognizes not the destruction, nor even the subversion of 
States, but their actual existence ; and it reasons from facts as they are, 
not from assumed or possible changes to be effected by continual Avar — 
mucli less docs it reason from mere chimeras. This absolute existence 
of the States Avhich constitute the Republic is the most palpable of all 
the fiicts Avitli Avhicli the American statesman has to deal. If many 
have stumbled over it into treason and rebellion, the fact, for all leo-iti- 
mate deductions and purposes, nevertheless remains. In a practical 
sense, at least, the States Avere before the American Union Avas. Ea^cu 
Avhile they Avere colonies of the British croAvn they still Avere embryo 
States — several, free, self-existing, and indestructible. Our Federal 
Republic exists, and henceforth and forever must exist, throuo-h, not the 
creation, but the combination of these several, free, self-existino-, stub- 
born States. These States are not stakes driven into the ground by an 
imperial hand, nor are they posts hauled together, squared, and hcAved, 
and so erected loosely upon it; but they are living, groAving, majestic 
trees, whose roots are Avidely spread and interlaced within the soil, and 
whose shade covers the earth. If at any time any of these trees shall 
be blown down or upturned by violence, it must be lifted up again in its 
proper place, and sustained by kindly hands until it has renewed its 



natural ?ta1)ility and croctness! If at any time the American Union is 
fractured tlirougli a lesion of one of its limbs, that limb must be restored 
to soundness before due constitutional health and vigor can be brought 
back to the '^\liole system. If one of these limbs offend, Ave have indeed 

the poAvcr and I will not cavil about the right — to cut it off and cast it 

invav from us; but Avlien we should have done that, Ave Avould have done 
just Avhat other nations less AA'ise than ourselves have done, that have 
submitted unnecessarily to amputation, and given up a material portion 
of their strength, to save themselves from apprehended destruction. We 
knoAV the inherent strength, vitality, and vigor of the Avhole American 
people. Wo neither passionately torment any offending limb, nor con- 
sent to its being cut off, because Ave knoAV that all of our limbs are capa- 
ble of being restored, and all are necessary to the prolongation of our 
national life. 

You Avill ask Avhether a reconciliation Avhich folloAvs so closely upon 
military coercion can be relied upon. Can it be sincere ? Can it 
be permanent ? I ansAver : Do you admit separation to be in any 
case possible? Does anybody noAV believe that it ever Avill hereafter be- 
come possible ? Will you yourselves noAV or ever consent to it ? You 
ansAA-er all these questions in the negative. Is not reconciliation, then, 
not only desirable, but imperative? Is any other reconciliation, under 
the circumstances, possible? Certainly you must accept this proposed 
reconciliation, or you must purpose to delay and Avait until you can pro- 
cure a better one. Good surgery requires that even simple Avounds, 
much more severe ones, shall be healed, if possible, at the first intention. 
Would not delay necessarily prolong anarchy ? Are you sure that you 
can procure a better reconciliation after prolonged anarchy, Avithout em- 
ploying force? Who Avill advocate the employment of force merely to 
hinder and delay, through prolonged anarchy, a reconciliation Avhich is 
feasible and perfectly consistent Avith the Constitution ? In Avhat part of 
the Constitution is Avritten the poAver to continue civil Avar against suc- 
cumbing States for ultimate political triumph? What Avould this be but, 
in fact, to institute a ncAV civil Avar, after one had ended Avith the com- 
plete attainment of the laAvful objects for Avhich it was Avaged ? Con- 
gress and the Administration have poAver to levy wars against foreign 



States for whatever cause tliey see fit. Congress and the President have 
a right to accept or even make war against any part of the people of the 
United States only under their limited power to suppress sedition and 
insurrection, and for that purpose only. What then? Must we give up 
the hope of further elevation of classes in the several States without any 
new guaranties for individual liberty and progress? By no means. 
Marching in this path of progress and elevation of masses is what we 
have been doing still more effectually in the prosecution of the war. It 
is a national march, as onward and irresistible as the late conflict be- 
tween free and slave laljor was vigorous and irrepressible. The plan of 
reconciliation we are pursuing has given us two great national advances 
in this progress of moral and political elevation, which are now to be 
made fast and firmly fixed. First, it secures a voluntary abolition of 
slavery by every State wliich has engaged in insurrection; and secondly, 
it must secure and does secure an effectual adoption by the late slave 
States themselves of the amendment of the Federal Constitution, which 
declares that neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except for crime, 
shall ever hereafter exist in any part of the United States. The people 
who have so steadily adliered to the true path of Democratic progress 
and civilization through all the seductions of peace, and through so many 
difficulties and at such fearful cost in Avar, will now have new inducements 
and encouragements to persevere in that path until they shall have suc- 
cessfully reduced to a verity the sublime assertion of the political equality 
of all men, Avliich tlie founders, in their immortal declaration, laid down 
as the true basis of .Vmerican Union. 

It is certain that the plan of reconciliation which I have thus largely 
explained must and will be adopted. It may, however, be hindered or 
hastened. How can it lie hindered? You shew yourselves aware of the 
answer when you fasten upon any violent, factious, or seditious exhibi- 
tion of passion or discontent in any of the lately rebellious States and 
argue from it the failure of the plan. You argue justly. Every turbu- 
lent and factious person in the lately insurrectionary States is resisting, 
hindering, and delaying the work of restoration to the extent of his 
ability. But the case is precisely the same with ourselves. Manifesta- 
tions of doubt, distrust, crimination, contempt, or defiance, in the loyal 



10 

►States, are equally injurious, and equally tend to delay the Avork of 
reconciliation. JIow, then, shall it he hastened ? I reply, virtually 
in the language of the President — in the spirit of the Constitution, 
and in harmony, not only 'with our politics, hut -with our religion. 
'•'We must trust each other.'' Can we not trust each other? Once 
Avo "Nvero friends. "We have since Ijcen enemies. We are friends 
ao-ain. But, whether in friendship or in enmity, in peace or in war, 
we are and can be nothing else to each other than brethren. A few 
evenings ago, an hundred Southern men, who recently had been 
more or less influential and leading revolutionists, visited my house at 
Washington. They were frank, unreserved, and earnest in their assur- 
ances of acquiescence and reconciliation, as I also was in mine. Happily, 
a party of intelligent Englishmen were in my dwelling at the same time. 
I introduced the late rebels to the representatives of sympathising Eng- 
land, and I said to the parties : " You lately each of you thought that 
the Southern men preferred Briti.sh rule to citizenship in the United 
States." While the Englishmen individually disclaimed, both parties 
promptly answered, as they do now, that the idea was not merely a 
delusion, but an absurd mistake. They now knew that even during the 
excitement of the war, the American citizen, whether North or South, 
really preferred his own countrymen of every section to any other people 
in the world. 

Some of you fear that the President may be too lenient to those 
Southern leaders who plunged the country into the calamities of civil 
war. Except those of you Avho have been maimed or bereaved, have any 
of you suifered more of wrong, insult, and violence at the hands of those 
leaders than he has ? Can we not forget w^here he can forgive ? Are 
you aware that his terms of amnesty are far more rigorous than those 
which were offered by Abraham Lincoln? Have you ever seen the 
majesty of law more firmly maintained than it has been by him in the 
exercise of discriminating clemency? Some of you seem to have been 
slightly disturbed by professions or demonstrations of favor toward the 
President made by parties who have heretofore opposed his administra- 
tion, as well as the administration of his predecessor. And you ask: 
May not the President yet prove unfaithful to us? For myself, I laid 



11 

aside partizanship, if I had any, in 18G1, Avlien the salvation of the 
country demanded that sacrifice. It is not, therefore, my purpose to 
descend to mere partizanship no^w. Andrew Johnson laid aside, 1 am 
sure, whatever of partizanship he had, at the same time. That noble act 
did not allow, but, on the other hand, it forbade collusion by the friends 
of the Union with opponents of the policies of the war and of reconcilia- 
tion which the Government has found it necessary to pursue. Duty re- 
quires absolute and uncompromising fidelity to the supporters of those 
policies, whosoever and of whatsoever party they may be. Andrew 
Johnson has practiced that fidelity against the violence of enemies, to 
the sacrifice of his fortune, the hazard of his liberty, and even the peril 
of his life. The same fidelity is still identified with the success of those 
policies, and, of course, is necessary to the achievement of their magnifi- 
cent ends. Why should he now abandon those policies, and desert 
time-honored and favored supporters, merely because the dawning suc- 
cess of our efforts lias compelled former opponents to approve and accept 
them? Patriotism and loyalty equally, however, require that fidelity in 
this case should be mutual. Be ye faithful, therefore, on your part, and 
although the security I offer is unnecessary and superfluous, yet 1 will 
guarantee fidelity on his part. Those who hitherto opposed the Presi- 
dent, but noAV profess to support him, either are sincere or insincere. 
Time must prove which is the fact. If they are sincere, who that has a 
loyal heart must not rejoice in their late, though not too-long-delayed 
conversion? If they are insincere, are we either less sagacious or have 
we less ability now than heretofore to counteract treachery to the 
national cause? Perhaps you fear the integrity of the man. I confess, 
with a full sense of my accountability, that among all the public men 
Avhom I have met or Avith whom I have been associated or concerned, in 
this or any other country, no one has seemed to me to bo more wholly 
free from personal caprice and selfish ambition than Andrew Johnson ; 
none to be more purely and exclusively moved in public action by love 
of country and good will to mankind. 

I hope I have said enough of the President. Shall I now speak of his 
associates in administration — the heads of executive departments, as they 
are called? I do it cheerfully, because now, for the first time, I am free 



12 

to speak of them as I truly regard and esteem them. Heretofore I couhl 
not do so without inviting what might prove injurious debate— moreover, 
I couhl not do so without seeming to desire for myself some exemption 
from censure, some exercise of clemency, which self-respect forbade me 
personally to invoke. For the time, I said to myself: 

" My name is lost : 
By treason's tooth bare-knawn aiKl eankoi-bit. 
Yet I am noble as the advir-rsai y 
I come to coi^e witlial."' 

That time has passed away. The present and the last Administrations 
are inseparably allied. Their work is now either completely done, or its 
end is near at hand. The heads of departments in these allied Adminis- 
trations are now separable without injury to the national safety and wel- 
fare. Each is entitled to his proper merit, and each must be content to 
bear his distinct responsibility. 

We have had three Secretaries of the Treasury. I believe that the 
fiscal system under which the nation has been conducted through greater 
difficulties than any other nation ever encountered was not only wisely 
projected and efficiently organized by Mr. Chase, but Avas the only one 
which, under the then existing circumstances, could have been successful. 
There has been since no departure from that plan, nor any relaxation in 
pursuing it, by either his immediate successor, Mr. Fessenden, or by Mr. 
McCulloch, the present incumbent. Intricate financial questions must 
continue to present themselves from time to time, until we shall have 
turned the outgoing tide of debt, and begun to experience the incoming 
flow of surplus revenue. For myself I can safely leave them to the care 
of the Secretary of the Treasury. 

We have had two Secretaries of War, Mr. Cameron and Mr. Stanton. 
The period of the first Avas short ; that of the last has been long. Of 
Mr. Cameron I bear witness that he was in all things honest, earnest, 
zealous, and patriotic. Of Mr. Stanton I am to speak in even more ex- 
alted praise. My acquaintance with him began amid the hours of deep 
and overwhelming solicitude which filled what may justly be called an 
interregnum which occurred between the election of Abraham Lincoln 
to the Presidency, in November, 1860, and his inauguration, in March, 
1861, and while Edwin M. Stanton was an acting member of the waning 
Administration of James Buchanan. From that time, through all the 



13 

period which elapsed until April, 1865, when the siege of the capital 
was raised, and the fearful tragedy of the country was closed with the 
assassination of the Chief Magistrate who had saved it, I hourly saw and 
closely observed, by night and by day, the Secretary of War. I s:iw 
him organize and conduct a war of pure repression, greater than any 
war which mankind has before experienced. In all that time I saw no 
great or serious error connnitted. I saw, as you have all seen, the great- 
est military results achieved — results which the whole world regarded as 
impossible. There is not one of those results that is not more or less 
directly due to the fertile invention, sagacious preparation, and indomit- 
able perseverance and energy of the Secretary of AVar. I have never 
known him to express or even betray a thought in regard to our country 
which was not divine. What remains to be done, by exhibiting military 
force in bringing the insurrectionary States out from anarchy into a con- 
dition of internal peace and co-operation Avitli the Government, may be 
safely trusted to him. 

I am equally satisfied with the naval administration of JNlr. Welles; 
and yet I am bound to acknowledge that, during the whole period of his 
service, the navy has practically enjoyed the administration of two saga- 
cious and effective chiefs. The Secretary of the Navy will himself, I 
am sure, approve and thank me for tins tribute to his assistant. Captain 
Fox. The Department has achieved glory enough to divide between 
them. 1 apprehend neither now nor in any near future any danger of 
maritime collision or conflict ; but I think tlic maintenance of naval pre- 
paration equally advantageous, both at home and abroad, with regard to 
(juestions which, without that precaution, might possibly arise. I am 
content to leave the responsibility of this case with Mr. Welles. 

We have had three Secretaries of the Interior, or Home Department 
— 'Mr. Smith, Mr. Usher, and Mr. Harlan. Amid the tumults of war 
and the terror inspired by foreign conspiracies, the operations of the 
Home Department have all the while been carried on without arresting 
attention, or even obtaining observation. It might be sufficient praise 
to say of its chiefs that now, when the time for scrutiny has come, those 
unobserved operations are found to have been faultless. But this is not 
all. A thousand, five thousand years hence, men Avill inquire when and 



14 

liy ^\■]\t)m ^vas projected and instituted the steam overland connection, 
Avliicli, (luiino- all the intervening period, will be seen to have indissolubly 
l)omid the distant coasts of the Pacific to the sliores of the Atlantic 
Ocean. The answer will be, it Avas projected and instituted by the Sec- 
retaries of the Interior during the administration of Abraham Lincoln. 

We have had two Postmaster Generals. No more prudent or efficient 
one than Montgomery Blair has ever presided in that Department. In 
his successor, Mr. Dennison, we find a practised statesman, who, under 
the improved circumstances of our national condition, is giving us special 
and peculiar cause for satisfiiction. He is promptly restoring the trans- 
portation of mails throughout the late theatre of war, and in that way 
performing an eminent part in the reconciliation of the American people. 
AVatchful of the interests of external as well as of internal commerce, 
ho has brought into action a new and direct postal line with Brazil, and 
thus has introduced us to more intimate intercourse with the States of 
South America. A year hence we shall see him extending commercial, 
political, and friendly connection to the islands of the Pacific and the 
great continents that lie beyond it. 

[ wish you all could understand Mr. Speed, the Attorney General, as 
I do. I do not know Avhether he is to be admired more for varied and 
accurate learning, or for what seems to be an intuitive faculty of moral 
philosophy. Only the delicate nervous system, which we all enjoy, but 
so seldom appreciate, seems to me to furnish a parallel for his quick sen- 
sibilities in the discovery and appreciation of truth. Firmer than most 
men in his convictions, and braver in his hopes of the progress of human- 
ity, he is nevertheless temperate, thoughtful, and wise in the conduct of 
administration. 

These arc they who were or are the counsellors and agents of the Pre- 
sident of the United States during the eventful period through Avhich Ave 
have passed. That they have ahvays agreed from tlie first in deciding 
the momentous questions Avitli Avhich they Avere engaged is not asserted. 
A Cabinet Avhich should agree at once on every such question Avould l)c 
no better or safer than one counsellor. Our republican system, and the 
political system of OA^ery free country, requires, if not a " multitude of 



15 

But this I do maintain and confidently proclaim, that every important 
decision of the Administration's has been wise. I maintain with equal 
firmness, and declare with still greater pleasure, the opinion that no 
council of government ever existed in a revolutionary period in any 
nation which was either more harmonious or more loyal to ea(di other, to 
their chief, and to their country. Had this council 1)een at any time 
less harmonious or less loyal, I should then have feared the downfall of 
the Republic. 

Happily, I need not enter the field to assign honors to our military and 
naval chiefs. Their achievements, while they have excited the admira- 
tion and won the affectionate gratitude of all our countrymen, have 
already become a grand theme of universal history. 

I omit to speak of foreign nations and of the proceedings of the Gov- 
ernment in regard to them for two reasons : first, because the discussion 
of such questions is for a season necessarily conducted without imme- 
diate publicity; the other is a reason I need not assign. Nevertheless, 
I may say in general terms this : We have claims upon foreign nations 
for injuries to the United States and their citizens, and other nations have 
presented claims against this Government for alleged injuries to them or 
their subjects. Although these claims are chiefly of a personal and 
pecuniary nature, yet the discussion of them involves principles essen- 
tial to the independence of States and harmony among the nations. I 
believe that the President will conduct this part of our affairs in such a 
manner as to yield and recover indemnities justly due, without any com- 
promise of the national dignity and honor. With whatever jealousy we 
may adhere to our inherited principle of avoiding entangling alliances 
with foreign nations, the United States must continue to exercise — as 
always before our civil war they did exercise — a just and beneficent in- 
fluence in the international conduct of foreign States, particularly those 
which are near to us on this continent, and which are especially endeared 
to us by their adoption of republican institutions. That just influence 
of ours was impaired, as might have been apprehended by the American 
people, when they fell into the distractions of civil war. With the return 
of peace it is coming back to us again, in greater strength than ever. I 
am sure that tliis important interest has not been lost sight of by the 



IG 

President of the United States for a single moment, and I expect that 
Ave shall see republican institutions, wherever they have been heretofore 
establislicd tlirougliout the American continent, speedily vindicated, re- 
ncAved, and reinvigorated. AMien I shall see this progress successfully 
worked out on the American continent, I shall then look for the signs of 
its successful working throughout the other continents. 

It is thus that I think the administrations of Abraham Lincoln and 
Andrew Johnson may be assumed as an epoch at which humanity Avill 
resume with new spirit and courage the career which, however sIoav, is 
nevertheless constantly directed toward the destruction of every form of 
human slavery, and tlie political equality of all men. 

And now, my dear friends and neighbors, after this pleasant interview, 
we part once more — you to continue, I hope with unabated success and 
pleasure, your accustomed domestic and social pursuits ; I to return to 
the Capital, there to watch and wait and work on a little longer. But 
we shall meet again. We came together to-day to celebrate the end of 
civil war. We will come together again under next October's sun, to 
rejoice in the restoration of peace, harmony, and union tliroughout the 
land. Until that time I refrain from what would he a pleasant task — 
the forecasting of the material progress of the country, the normal in- 
crease of population by birth and immigration, and its diffusion over the 
now obliterated line of Mason and Dixon, to the Gulf of Mexico, and 
over and across the Rocky Mountains along the border of Mexico to the 
Pacific Ocean. I say now only this: Go on, fellow-citizens, increase and 
multiply as you have heretofore done. Extend channels of internal 
commerce as the development of agricultural, forest, and mineral re- 
sources requires. Improve your harbors, consolidate the Union now 
while you can, without unconstitutionally centralizing the Government, 
and henceforth you Avill enjoy, as a tribute of respect and confidence, 
that security at homo and that consideration abroad which maritime 
powers of the world have of late, when their candor wus specially 
needed, only reluctantly and partially conceded. May our Heavenly 
Father bless you and your families and friends, and have you all in His 
holy keeping until the rolling months shall bring around that happy 
meeting in 186G; and so, for the present, farewell. 



LIBRARY OF 



CONGRESS 




013 785 6712 



